SBS goes fully nude in streaker ad campaign
SBS has launched a new ad campaign featuring a naked running man and slogan “We go there”.
The campaign, from Droga5 ANZ, features several video ads and an outdoor campaign with starkly different treatments. The outdoor campaign features pithy statements in black text on a plain yellow background, while the videos are cinematic and reference some of SBS’s most well-known TV properties.
The main 60-second video begins with a man taking his clothes off in a dressing room, running nude into a sports stadium, and then progressing through a series of sets including Alone Australia.
Because this version contains full-frontal nudity, it will only be available on SBS On Demand. There is a more demure 30s edit for general distribution.
SBS Chief Marketing and Commercial Officer Jane Palfreyman said she didn’t think audiences would find the ad too shocking.
“We’ve done so much audience testing on that,” she said. ”Broadly the feedback was really refreshingly positive. They understood the intent. And, I think it speaks to people really understanding who SBS is, where we’ve come from, where we are going and that this campaign is very true to who we are at its heart.”
When asked whether sporting bodies might construe the ad as an encouragement to streakers, Palfreyman said “it was a way of talking about the SBS offer”.
“The art is definitely a bit cheeky. So is our brand. That streaker, it’s done in a very playful way. It is a metaphor. It’s a tongue-in-cheek way to experience our broad content offering. Streakers are also a part of our history and are synonymous with sport and with football. And SBS has a long history, particularly with football.”
The campaign’s videos were directed by Damien Shatford from The Sweetshop.
Jane Palfreyman
Palfreyman, who is responsible for SBS sales as well as marketing, said it had been “a challenging year for all media”. However, her commercial team was emphasising SBS’s point of difference, incremental audience and the importance of the 35-64 year-old demographic.
“And so we’re dealing with the instability pretty well, I would say … we’re coming into Tour de France. We’ve got a massive year next year with World Cup, so we’re pretty excited about the slate ahead.”
Palfreyman would not be drawn on the cost of the We Go There campaign development or its media spend.
“We have been in the trenches on this for a number of months really, working with Droga to understand our brand strategy and content slate and the breadth of the SBS offering,” she said.
“It feels like a beautiful campaign that’s the result of a wonderful partnership and anchored in audience insights and it’s got the network behind it. I’m really keen to unleash it into the wild and get audience feedback and monitor from there.”
Credits
Client: SBS
Chief Marketing and Commercial Officer: Jane Palfreyman
Head of Creative: Joel Noble
Head of Marketing and Media: Uma Oldham
Project Lead: Becky Honey
Marketing Manager: Lauren Phelan
Creative Manager: Peter Jeffs
Producer: Amanda Galkin
Agency: Droga5
Chief Executive Officer ANZ: Matt Michael
Chief Creative Officer APAC: Tara Ford
Chief Client Officer: Belinda Drew
Executive Creative Director: Barbara Humphries
Creative Director: Sam Dickson
Creative Director: Cameron Bell
Associate Creative Director: Lennie Galloway
Associate Creative Director: Thomas Gledhill
Head of Strategy: Ben De Castella
Senior Producer: Elliot Liebermann
Senior Business Director: Samar Karim
Production Company: The Sweetshop
Director: Damien Shatford
Producer: Allison Lockwood
Co-Managing Director: Edward Pontifex
Co-Managing Director: Greg Fyson
Executive Producer: Kate Roydhouse
DOP: Ross Giardina
Art Director: Mile Pitt
Casting: Danny Long Casting
Stills Photographer: Michael Malherbe
Editorial: ARC @arc_site
Executive Producer – Daniel Bradford Fry
Producer – Sally Quade @salquade
Editor – Lucas Baynes @lucasbaynes
Assistant Editor- Amelia Pieri @ameliapfilms
Colourist – Fergus Rotherham @fergrotherham
Online Artist – Richard Lambert
Colour & Online Assistant – Max Wyld & Christian Misuraca
Music Creative Director: Adrian Sergovich
Sound Designer: Simon Kane
Executive Producer: Katrina Aquilia
Media agency: Hearts and Science
Group Business Director: Blake Power
Account Director: Oliver Woodrow
Personally I would be embarrassed to put my name to this ad. Surely SBS can do better!
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Just curious to see if there would be a “really refreshing positive ” opinion if this commercial was redone with a visibly full nude female?
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Nice to see SBS get back to its roots.
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